The Municipal Services Committee met 02/20/2023. One of the items they voted on was a request to approve the scope of Complete Streets pedestrian study. Back in March of 2022, the Common Council approved Resolution 2-R-22 which included allocating $75,000 in excess general fund dollars for a pedestrian safety study. City staff was now asking to use those funds to hire a consultant to perform a Complete Streets study which would include a pedestrian/crosswalk portion but would address other street-related issues as well.
Staff wanted to sign a sole source contract with Alta Consultants who has been the city’s bike and pedestrian consultant to:
- Review and update the City’s Complete Streets Policy
- Review and update the City’s existing Mid-Block Crosswalk Policy and Enhanced Crosswalk Policy
- Develop a Complete Streets Design Guide
- Provide a Complete Streets Presentation for the City’s Municipal Services Committee
The Municipal Services Committee members voted unanimously to approve the updated scope of the study.
I’ve prepared a complete transcript of the discussion for download.
City Traffic Engineer Eric Lom explained to the committee that, in talking with alderpersons after the resolution was passed last year, it was discovered that there were a lot of different ideas about what the pedestrian safety study ought to entail. Staff felt that expanding the scope to what they were now asking for was the best way to help a majority of the council members get what they were seeking.
The consultant would update the city’s current Complete Street’s policy which, while ahead of its time when first created, was fairly basic and out of date at this point.
They would also review a number of the city’s current policies including the Mid-Block Crosswalk Policy and the Intersection Crosswalk Policy, look at them in their totality, and try to come up with a consolidated policy that worked well for the city. As part of that they would look at the city’s collector and arterial streets and prioritize approximately 15 locations throughout the city that would be best suited for improvements.
Alta would also develop a Complete Streets Design Guide. Currently the city does not have a design guide. This would integrate the city’s Complete Streets philosophy into a guide that the engineers could reference when they were designing streets.
The timeline for the consultant to complete this was around 6 months and the city expected it to cost the full $75,000. They had basically gone to Alta with a list of the things they wanted done and asked them what they could do for $75,000, and the above listed items were what Alta came back with. The final contract would be an “actual cost not to exceed” contract, so they wouldn’t go beyond the $75,000 allocated.
The city wanted to enter into a sole source contract with Alta Consultants because they had served as the city’s bike and pedestrian consultant and had done good work and been trustworthy.
There was some discussion about whether this change in scope should also be brought before the Finance Committee, but because the funding had already been approved it seemed that it did not need to be. When it came time to actually award the contract, that would come before the Finance Committee.
Alderperson Chad Doran (District 15) asked about the Crosswalk Policy portion of the study. The city was currently almost finished updating all the crosswalks identified in the existing Enhanced Crosswalk Program, but this new study would result in 15 more locations to be updated. He wondered if they really needed to do more than what they had already done.
Engineer Lom said that the city had hit all the low-hanging fruit and this would allow them to find the next batch of locations that could be updated. He mentioned that staff hears a lot of concerns about some of the crossings at the large roundabouts. Those had not been anything that had been considered as part of the existing crosswalk program. Whether any changes were be affordable or of priority to the city would be a discussion for budget-time, but they at least wanted to provide the Council with a prioritized list that they could work from if the funding was available.
Alderperson Katie Van Zeeland (District 5) asked that consultations with alderpersons on safety issues in their districts be included as part of the data gathering process for the study. Engineer Lom said that could be included and recommended that the cheapest and most efficient way to handle that would be for him to reach out to alderpersons at the correct time, gather their feedback, aggregate that information, and send it on to Alta.
Alderperson Van Zeeland amended the item to include alderperson feedback in the study process. That amendment passed unanimously. The committee members had no further comments or questions, so they proceeded to unanimously approve the item as amended.
View full meeting details and video here: https://cityofappleton.legistar.com/MeetingDetail.aspx?ID=1083498&GUID=07D59BAD-C272-46E2-A606-3C7C0D23F531
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